A partnership development process assessment scale for public health nurses in Japan.

Objective: The objective of this study was to develop and test a Partnership Development Process Assessment (PDPA) scale for content and construct validity and internal consistency reliability. This is needed to document and evaluate community health partnership development processes between public health nurses and community-based organizations in Japan.

Design: The study was conducted in three phases. Ten semi-structured interviews were conducted to generate items for a new scale. Thirty items were generated and reviewed by an expert panel for content validity and item refinement. A national postal survey of public health nurses was conducted to determine the scale's internal structure, evaluate its reliability, and explore its construct and criterion validity.

Measures: Validity and reliability testing of the PDPA scale using a content validity index and analysis of correlations with an existing scale were performed.

Results: Twenty-six items were selected and grouped into four factors: activities to share roles to manage community health issues, platform activities to support partnerships, activities to evaluate partnership practices, and activities to share information regarding community health issues. After factor analysis, 23 items were retained.

Conclusion: The PDPA scale is a valid and reliable instrument for public health nurses to assess partnership development activities.